Nevada has a Republican Governor. Given the demographics I find it astounding any Republican can win a statewide race there but that’s another issue for another time. The point is that Gov. Joe Lombardo is a Republican. This week at a rally Las Vega rally for Trump Lombardo called for a “Moment of Silence” to honor a fallen police officer – and got BOOED by the crowd! Why? Because of his name. It sounded (because it is) “Muslim” and that was more than enough to ignite a demonstration of anti-Muslim bigotry that runs deep and wide in the Republican Party.
It didn’t matter that Austin Abdelnabi had a good ole American FIRST name. His last name was ‘moos-lum’ sounding and that was more than enough for all those “Real Mur-ick-un’ MAGAS to boo. After reading Buzzfeed’s account of the incident I can’t help but wonder how many of those GOPer bigots have offered the service to this country Officer Abdelnabim a 3 gave over the course of his too short life. 30-year-old Austin Abdelnabi was a Las Vegas police officer and US Marine Corps veteran. He was fatally shot Tuesday after being “ambushed’ by an armed suspect. To his credit Gov. Lombardo tried to do a John McCain type ‘no – we aren’t going to be like that’ statement but he might as well have been talk to a brick wall:
“So I know Pastor Teis spoke about Officer Abdelnabi a few moments ago,” began Lombardo before a string of boos rang out in the room. “No, no, we’re not booing, we’re not booing him,” continued Lombardo as he shook his head. “He’s the officer that passed away here recently, so…”
The linked article goes on to say at least one news outlet (The Nevada Independent) stated the crowd reaction was likely a response to hearing a name reminding them of the new Democratic Senate candidate in Michigan – Abdul El-Sayed. For MAGAs it seems nothing or no one that seems ‘A-rab’ or ‘Muslim’ is to be even tolerated, much less honored for service to our country and their city even when they give their life doing so. Critics on social media were quick to react:
Is there any elected Republican speaking out against how virulently racist so much of the party has become? I’ve never seen anything like this in my lifetime. https://t.co/UIfyzguBmM
– Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) August 5, 2026
Well, Lombardo tried but given the crowd response I doubt he’ll try to say anything positive about a Muslim for the rest of his term. Trump has spent years fomenting a disdain, even hatred of all things Muslim with his MAGAs and even Republicans sort of next to the dividing line between normal and this bigoted insanity know better than to speak up. The thing is, as always when it comes to religious bigotry, racism, sexism etc. silence is complicity! Raw Story’s Matthew Chapman summed it up well with his own tweet:
MAGA is just reflexively attacking anyone with a Middle Eastern sounding name now.Between this, and MAGA voters in Michigan rejecting *Trump-endorsed* Amir Hassan in favor of a Some Dude who dropped out of the race weeks ago… just insanely bleak. https://t.co/yUsVN5BKBO
This folks is the Republican Party, clearly remade in Donald Trump’s nasty image.
Here in Texas, during the primary season, the repubs were running TV ads that warned against Sharia law, radical Islam, etc. Many of the candidates repeated such tripe in their stump speeches. If I’m not mistaken I think even Gov. Greg Abbott got in on the Muslim bashing. So, the general public gets it from several sources.